


We Meet Again

by bottledspirits



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-08-14
Updated: 2013-08-14
Packaged: 2017-12-23 10:53:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/925523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bottledspirits/pseuds/bottledspirits
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rumpelstiltskin receives an unexpected guest.</p>
            </blockquote>





	We Meet Again

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this fic just for iambicdearie. The rest of you can scarper.

There was that damn dripping again. It was near-constant down here, though he had no idea why. It wasn’t as if there was any water nearby. He’d checked.

It certainly was damp, however. Damp and dank and dark. Moisture glistened on the rough-hewn stone walls. The flicker of the torches that burned somewhere down the passageway set them off quite nicely.

He didn’t know why they put the torches so far away. Maybe they were afraid he could do something with them.

Maybe they thought the light was too good for him.

Fortunately, the torches were not the only means of illuminating his cozy little den. If they were, he’d have gone further off the deep end than he already had.

Rumpelstiltskin leaned back against the wall of his prison. It was slimy, as all things down here eventually became, but he paid it no mind. He’d grown used to it.

He gazed up at the ceiling, where a metal grate blocked the only entrance to the cell. Rumpelstiltskin had tried to move it at least a dozen times, the same as he had done with the wooden bars on the wall opposite his bed, but the grate would not budge. The thing must have weighed a thousand pounds.

It also, however, provided the only sunlight to be found in his cell. For that reason alone, Rumpelstiltskin had spent countless hours staring at it. He felt he had every inch of the thing committed to memory.

There was no knowing what lay outside that grate. It could have been a bog, for all he knew, although he doubted that. This place reeked of mildew and decay; the only fresh air came from heavenly little gusts from the other side of that grate. It couldn’t be a bog.

A forest, maybe. At least, that’s what he liked to think. A patch of woods at the edge of a village, with a little house just off the beaten path. There would be a wheel by the fireplace and two cloaks hanging by the door.

That was what he liked to imagine. There was no one around to tell him otherwise.

Rumpelstiltskin stared into the light until he saw spots dancing in front of his eyes. He was just considering scaling the wall to reach for those tantalizing threads of sun when he heard a noise from down the passageway. The outer door was being opened.

Who could it be? Not the trembling fool who brought what passed for food in this place – that wouldn’t be for another day or so, depending on whatever mood the head guard was in. Sometimes he wondered if they were trying to see whether he could starve to death or not. Why did they bother to keep him alive at all? Why not lock all the doors and leave him there to go mad in the dark?

Of course, then they wouldn’t be able to use him when they needed. Rumpelstiltskin grinned at the memory of his two latest – and so far only – visitors. They’d been very anxious, hadn’t they? So quick to lock him away, yet so quick to run to him for help at the first sign of trouble. The vagabond princess and her little shepherd hadn’t learned how to live without magic yet, it seemed.

Rumpelstiltskin caught sight of the stranger, taking note of a long skirt and a pair of heels under the dark cloak that was the customary garb of all who entered the passage. A woman, then. Snow White perhaps, sneaking back to seek his counsel without the watchful eye of her husband? Or maybe it was Regina, there to ask about the Dark Curse? She must have had trouble with it. He couldn’t understand what was taking her so long, otherwise.

And she would have his help, oh yes. For a price.

The newcomer drew closer. Rumpelstiltskin sat as still as a cat in the shadows, waiting for his moment.

“Rumpelstiltskin?” his visitor called out uncertainly. Yes, definitely a woman. He could tell by the voice, though he could not see her face.

He stood and unfurled himself in one slow movement before creeping to the bars. She stood on the other side, just out of reach should he have chosen to reach for her. Smart girl. So few of the people who sought him out had much of a head on their shoulders.

 “Careful, dearie,” Rumpelstiltskin warned, curling his hands around the bars as the light fell on his face. “Names have power, you know.”

He heard her let out a gasp.

“So…you  _are_  Rumpelstiltskin?” she asked breathlessly.

The imp let out a giggle and cocked his head at her.

“Who else were you expecting to find down here, dearie?” Rumpelstiltskin quipped.

The woman made a noise and turned away, hiding her face behind one hand. At first he thought he’d offended her, but then…she couldn’t be  _laughing_ , could she? Yet there she was, one hand pressed to her side while the other masked what sounded very much like a giggle.

Rumpelstiltskin stared at the girl. Was she mad, too?

She noticed him watching and straightened up.

“I’m sorry,” she said, and there was humor in her voice as she spoke. “I…I’m just so relieved.”

He frowned.

“There aren’t many people who would say that to me,” Rumpelstiltskin said warily.

The woman grew very still. He suspected that underneath the hood she was no longer smiling.

“I suspect there aren’t many people who would seek your help more than once, either,” she replied in a grave voice.

That gave him pause. He squinted through the bars, trying to get a better look at the woman.

“Have we…met before?” Rumpelstiltskin asked doubtfully. He never forgot anyone. Surely he wouldn’t have forgotten her voice if he’d heard it?

He saw the hood shake as if she had moved her head, but there was no knowing what the gesture meant, her face obscured as it was. She seemed to realize this and tossed the hood back with an impatient gesture.

Now he saw her clearly. She was young and pretty, with long brown curls and a well-shaped face. But there was something sad in the way she looked at him. Her eyes, he reflected, were the color of the sky that he struggled in vain to see every day. He leaned closer to the bars to look at them without realizing what he was doing. The girl didn’t notice.

“No, we haven’t met. But my father did ask your help once. Perhaps you remember? Lord Maurice of Littleton?” she said. She stepped toward the bars as she spoke, seemingly unaware that she was walking closer to danger.

“Ah,” Rumpelstiltskin said, remembrance bringing a wicked smile to his face. “Yes, I remember. That former knight who fancied himself a king. He sent me a message. Something about…”

He lifted his hands theatrically.

“’Help, help, we’re dying! Can you save us?”

He lowered his hands again to grasp the bars and turned to her, grinning.

“And that would make you Lady Belle of the Marchlands,” Rumpelstiltskin sneered. “Isn’t that right?”

The woman was glaring at him, her eyes hard.

“Yes, that’s right,” Belle said icily.

A little chuckle escaped his lips. The imp leaned toward her until their eyes were level through the bars. She was a tiny thing, even next to him. It was a wonder she had the courage to stand so close.

“But I had no use for your father’s gold. Not when I could make it myself with the wave of a hand,” Rumpelstiltskin purred, enjoying the fury in her face.

“Yet here you are,” she said evenly.

That brought him up short. But then he rallied and found it in himself to leer at her.

“Yes, here I am. Which brings me to the question…what are  _you_ doing here? Come to get revenge for your little town?” he taunted.

She startled him by striding directly to the bars and placing her hands next to his, gripping the spears of wood as if her life depended on it. He gaped at her.

“I want your  _help!_ ” the girl pleaded.

They watched each other for a moment, she with a look of desperation, he with an expression of such puzzlement that it wiped the impish grin off his face.

“Please,” she added.

Rumpelstiltskin fidgeted with the bars, glancing away to stare at the dirt floor. She was watching him with such sincerity that he found it difficult to meet her eye. He was used to making deals with the desperate, but it was rare that anyone truly begged for his help.

“And what would you have me do, hmm?” he asked at last, glancing down to look at her through the corner of his eye. “I’m not much help to anyone down here, I’m afraid.”

She paused as if to catch her breath and licked her lips before she spoke.

“And if I could set you free?” Belle whispered. They were so close now, each pressed against the bars that formed the only barrier between them, that there was no doubt he could hear her.

Rumpelstiltskin froze. His eyes darted to her face. The imp’s too-wide pupils contracted slightly as he scrutinized the woman. Her eyes got bluer and bluer the closer he stood to her, but aside from that he could read nothing in her face. No deceit, no trickery; just anxiety and hope, flickering across her features by turns.

“How would you manage that?” he hissed at last, so near that she no doubt felt his breath on her face.

Belle shook her head.

“First you have to agree to help me find my father,” she commanded.

He grinned, showing yellowed, rotting teeth. So the deal had begun.

“And if he’s no where to be found?” Rumpelstiltskin asked, always careful not to miss a trick. He didn’t want to get stuck in some deal with no out.

Her face fell, and she looked as if she’d been stabbed through the heart. Before he could say anything more, however, she turned her face away from him and spoke.

“Then you will be free of all obligations once I discover what has become of him,” Belle said, her eyes fixed on the floor.

He could think of nothing to say to that. For a moment, nothing was said. The silence weighed heavily in the darkness, broken only by the crackle of the torches that flickered down the passage.

“This plan of yours – it can get me out of here in one piece?”

Her head snapped up, and he felt a strange thrill as her eyes settled on his face. Eyes the color of the sky. He found he could not look at them enough, and he wondered if it was the sky he craved, or the warmth of another living creature.

“Yes,” Belle said quietly.

“With my magic intact?” Rumpelstiltskin asked. Gone was the jeering tone and mocking grin. He was serious now.

“Most definitely,” she said, nodding.

A strange feeling came over him then. It was something akin to both greed and hope. He would be free of this place. He would have his power again, if only for a short time.

“And how do you know you can trust me once you’ve set me loose?” the imp teased.

But Belle’s steady gaze did not as much as flicker.

“They say you never break a deal,” she said, in all seriousness. “So I’ll just have to trust you.”

 “Well, if that’s the case…” Rumpelstiltskin drawled, his eyes alight with glee. He drew himself up so he once more had the advantage of height over her and put one hand through the bars. A verbal contract was as binding as a written one, in most cases, but Rumpelstiltskin was curious to see what she would do. Could she bring herself to shake the hand of a beast?

Belle glanced at the offered hand before looking back at him.

“We have a deal?” she asked.

He nodded at her. He was almost quivering in anticipation.

“Indeed we do,” Rumpelstiltskin replied.

She reached out slowly and placed her hand in his. He curled his fingers around her hand, enjoying the warmth of her skin. He leaned closer, still holding her hand, and whispered as near to her ear as he could manage:

“Work your magic, dearie.”


End file.
